Anti-Tank useless?

[Kael]

can someone explain to me what is an EFFECTIVE template of how to use anti-tank guns?

tbh - it feels that the combination with anti-air + artillery is a far better combination because of a simple fact: if your division gets attacked by tanks, they will always be shattered.

[The Tomekeeper]

i think it just gives hard attack?

[Kael]

Yes. But when i give an Divison Anti Tank it should hold back tanks. Or even slow them down to a big percentage. Which it seems it doesnt do. I tried it now in some playtrough with Anti-Tank companies in my divisions. I cant see any difference. Im just wasting a slot.

Even added some AT-Bataillons. Still: it doesnt really work.

[I'mLiterallyRyanGosling]

Have you went superior firepower?
All it does is adds hard attack, it doesn't necessarily mean its anti-tank. Basically stats wise you are making slow moving tank divisions when you make anti-tank divisions. Doesn't mean it can hold tanks, but it can damage them unlike soft attack.

However with superior firepower doctrine (spec into the artillery roles on the right tree) and a fort line you can absolutely hold tanks. Just adding the artillery is not enough, though it does help from an offensive stand point.

-tanks kill tanks on mass, the artillery is just there to support the infantry and too many artillery will bottom out your organisation and you will die this way regardless of numbers and equipment

[The Tomekeeper]

Originally posted by 🅶 I|I Kael π:

Yes. But when i give an Divison Anti Tank it should hold back tanks. Or even slow them down to a big percentage. Which it seems it doesnt do. I tried it now in some playtrough with Anti-Tank companies in my divisions. I cant see any difference. Im just wasting a slot.

Even added some AT-Bataillons. Still: it doesnt really work.

the support at company is smaller than 1 unit of AT

[Gamer Maid]

Most of tank divisions will always be able to push an infantry one except if there is too much penalties. But one utility AT has is when you are facing divisions with very high hardness and hard attack (so against heavy TDs with mechs), you can push this divisions with infantry and a lot of AT (like 5 or 6 batalions) because you won't be deorg too fast since inf don't have hardness and you will be able to stack a good value of hard attack with superior fire power (right-left). You can even hold with France pretty decently like this if the allies give you green air.

But of course in SP it is 100% useless because the AI sucks at using tanks anyway. Also for some reason Paradox will nerf them in the 1.11.12 which is irrelevant IMO because very soon AT will be completely useless in MP as well.

[lakupupu]

theyre artillery but for tanks - and the ai isnt famous for building tanks anyway... of course its rather ineffective

in multiplayer its a whole other story thoughg

[Freelancer]

Originally posted by dragon:

theyre artillery but for tanks - and the ai isnt famous for building tanks anyway... of course its rather ineffective

in multiplayer its a whole other story thoughg

The AI actually builds a lot of tanks now and they're pretty good at using them too. Of course you can still cheese them but it ain't like the old AI where it was just WW1 redux with the AI producing mass infantry divisions.

[Gamer Maid]

I noticed that I forgot to answer about the template (for MP of course) :

8 marines and 6 AT with support engi, arty, field hospital, logistic and AA. Field hospital is just for xp purposes because this boys will have hard fights and you want to keep the +25% bonus from the lvl 3.

BUT paradox will take off too much of piercing from the gun to make them worth it with the 1.11.12 patch. So it will be 100% useless in MP because to make short :

- Medium tanks have better speed
- Heavys can have more armor
- Marines with AT to beat the slow heavys
- The speed of the mediums to make pockets of Marines

The marines can be countered by mediums with trucks instead of mech to not have too much hardness so the AT guns won't be able to deorg the medium fast enough to win most of the fights.

The issue is since they will nerf piercing from AT guns, you won't be able to pierce heavys anymore SO EVERYBODY will do heavys knowing that you will have 100% guarentee to not be pierced by AT anymore.

The funny thing is if they keep the change (and knowing paradox, they will) it is the return of the old meta from BEFORE No Step Back while pretty much everybody was just doing heavys. What a meme ^^

[Gamer Maid]

I forgot one thing : the point of this template is to rush AT techs to have around 110 piercing and I don't remember the exact value of hard attack but you can have more than 250 and the industrial cost is less than 3k per division. But since the breakthrough is just infantry breakthrough, you will struggle to keep your org while attacking mediums if they don't use mech and if the guy who made the medium kept the highest speed as possible, they can just move around you and have the initiative of where and when to fight.

The funny thing is I noticed that many people don't even know about this strat. If you join a lobby, and you see that everybody is going for big fat and slow heavys, they will have a nasty surprise. So enjoy, cuz it won't last.

[TasteDasRainbow]

Hard attack and piercing.

Having 'enough' piercing ensures they don't get the armored buff, which is significant.

Having larger amounts of hard attack ensures that you can deal damage to higher 'hardness' divisions, which is typical of heavier and more numerous heavy tanks.

[S2]

Well, in WW2 AT didnt specifically stop large scale tank assaults unless in combination with obstacles, mines and tanks as the Russians did during Zitadelle.

But AT guns could influct heavy casualties on tanks, even if they only destroyed the tanks chain. E.g. Germany didnt build more than 30-40 Tiger tanks per month, so losing a few was a very big deal.

Also, it was very common to use AA guns like the 8,8 in ground attack against tanks,

So in HOI4 it is normally much more effective to just put 2xAA and 2xArt battalions in an infantry division (not in garrison/occupation divisions) than AT. If needed build a few motorized AT brigades to stop enemy tank breakthroughs.

Imo Paradox can very well nerf AT further, they should just remove tungsten to be required to build them, thats imo the main issue. (Like make base version steel only, and allow for stronger upgrades with tungsten/chromium shells).

[Gamer Maid]

Originally posted by S2:

Imo Paradox can very well nerf AT further, they should just remove tungsten to be required to build them, thats imo the main issue. (Like make base version steel only, and allow for stronger upgrades with tungsten/chromium shells).

Nerfing AT means that it won't be able to pierce heavys so everybody will do heavys. It is really bad for the meta cuz everybody will do the same thing in MP while it was possible to have AT infantry and to build mediums to counter it. So it will be 10 times more boring.

[Bored Peon]

The one thing people failed to mention is the hardness.

Just because the AI has an army with a tank symbol does not mean it is all tanks. Look at some of your own templates, 2 tanks and 4 infantry, yet uses a tank symbol.

That is where hardness will come into play, at 50% hardness you do/take 50% damage from soft and 50% from hard attacks.

I could go more into it, but need to see some screenshots:
1. Your composition.
2. The AI template composition.
3. A screenshot of the actual battle taking place showing the modifiers.
The screenshots also help because it can put information and advice into something you can apply it to easier.

You can have a superior tech, superior template composition and get curb stomped by the AI because it is using a bigger width and/or more experienced general.

[Kael]

Generally i am trying Spain with Carlist atm and i am trying different templates.
Especially Artillery + Anti-Air work very well against AI. Thats why AT feels generally useless. Also my units hold longer when i have no AT in it... strangely

[Gamer Maid]

Originally posted by 🅶 I|I Kael π:

Generally i am trying Spain with Carlist atm and i am trying different templates.
Especially Artillery + Anti-Air work very well against AI. Thats why AT feels generally useless. Also my units hold longer when i have no AT in it... strangely

Because it reduces the org. So if you don't need the hard attack, you just nerf your division.